


Single Stone seeking dead Knife (is he dead?)

by Keenir



Series: Single Stone [2]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie) Compliant, Gen, Guardians Of The Galaxy (Movie) Compliant, local boy makes good
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-16
Updated: 2015-09-16
Packaged: 2018-04-20 23:57:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4807166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keenir/pseuds/Keenir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Good News:  Loki might not be dead.<br/>Bad News:  Angrboda has him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Single Stone seeking dead Knife (is he dead?)

"You wanted to see us, Heimdall?" Fandral asked, still no less uneasy stepping into Heimdall's office than he ever had been, what with all the security monitors and so many rings of keys hanging from hooks.

"I asked to see my sister," Heimdall replied, not turning around in his chair to greet the four.

"Your message explicitly referred to me as such, thus we were concerned for your safety," Sif replied.  "I don't even see Amora."

The sorceress' release had been one of several necessities required for national security in the wake of Prince Thor's abdication.   _And the lengths he goes, stops just shy of striking himself from the rolls of citizenship._

"It was she who convinced me that I have been keeping this from you for long enough as it is," Heimdall said.

"Amora as the voice of reason?" Hogun asked.

"Talk about scary," Fandral said.

"She is reforming herself," Heimdall said.  "Slowly, but step by step."

"And this secret you were holding?" Sif asked.

"Loki is not dead," he said.

None of them said a word; just looked to Sif, stone-faced and taking that news in.  "A lie," she said at last.

"I do not lie," Heimdall said. 

"You never cared for Loki, Heimdall, we know that," Volstagg said.  "We got it, how the two of you always were ill at ease around one another."

Fandral nodded.  "But this, this is another thing entirely.  Too low a blow.  Even out of the blue like this."

"My feelings do not enter into this," Heimdall said.

Even Hogun made a noise of disbelief at that.

"This is the address you'll find him at," Heimdall said, holding out a slip of printer paper, the old sort that still had perforated edges.

Sif didn't take it from him.

"Sif?" Fandral asked her.  "If there's a chance..."

She shook her head.  "He's dead.  There was an inquest.  There was a search.  Loki is most definitely dead."

"3 Iron Wood Lane," Sif said, reading it.  Glaring at her half-brother, "If I find this is a waste of my time, Heimdall, not even Amora will be able to stitch you back together."

"Wait," Volstagg said, looking around Sif's shoulder at the address.  "This is in Jot-"

"It is," Heimdall said.

"Your gadgetry lets you look through the cameras there too?"

"For a few weeks.  Long enough to confirm it was Loki there, in that place."

* * *

* * *

"Nice place," Hogun remarked as they walked up to the outer edge of the yard, looking at the house at 3 Iron Wood Lane.

"If you like quiet cottages," Fandral said, trying to read something of Sif's mood at seeing where Loki was living - _and failing still._

The doorknob turned, and they could hear a woman saying "Down, down, wait."  The door opened, and -

Fandral found himself knocked to the ground, some hulking behemoth of a dog looking down at him.  _Suppose I should count the minor blessing it isn't horny or slobbering._

"Fenrir, up!" said the same woman's voice as before; the dog obeyed, sitting next to Fandral, watching as he stood and rejoined his friends.  "Can I be helping you?" the woman asked.

"Who are you?" Sif asked.

"This is my house.  Answer your question first yourself, then I may."

"I am Sif.  Loki was my friend."

Hogun looked at Volstagg, who shrugged.

The woman said, "I am Angrboda Helsma.  Please, come in," she invited.  And, looking at Fandral when she said it, "And wipe your feet on your way in."

"Of course, mi'lady," Fandral said.

"You have a lovely home," Volstagg said, looking at how fur rugs lined every bit of floor, and all the chairs were well padded, and seemingly every inch of the log walls was covered in pictures.

"Thank you," Angrboda said.

Nearly all the pictures were neatly framed - some from lumber, others from cardboard and ornate paper, others from sticks, a few from soda cans and staffs.  Every single picture was a photograph of an animal of some sort.

"You're a scientist?" Fandral asked.

"Nature photographer," Angrboda said, watching these strangers in her home.

"And that?" Sif asked, looking at the lone photo of a person: high-cheekboned and strong-jawed with a snub of a nose and piercing gaze.

"You have a lovely girlfriend," Fandral said to their hostess, in regard to the photo.

"That," Angrboda said, "is General Skadi.  She's been holding this country together since your lot assassinated General Laufey."

Sif trusted herself to say one thing: "We're here to see Loki."

 _"Logi un a scescori,"_ Angrboda muttered.  "Down the hall, last door on your left.  Asgardians do know left from right, yes?"

 _Any other time, Fandral would be asking to show him personally and privately several times because of attention issues,_ Sif knew, as she made her way down   _Thank you for refraining at this time, my friend.  You can come back later and ask her_.   Sif opened that last left door, and stepped into a room devoid of photographs, drawings, or any artwork other than the finely-crafted wooden desk graced with papers and pens and inkwells.

Beside the desk was a broad cot built so sturdily that Sif nearly mistook it for a bed.  She stood beside it, inhaling deeply from the cot and the desk.  _Loki was here.  I know it.  I can barely detect anything of him, but given how much he loved to wash, that's hardly surprising.  So what happened?  Are you out at the groceries at this moment, Loki?_

Hogun knocked on the wall.  When Sif turned to face him, "Our hostess is leaving.  She did not ask us to depart, and did not seem to care."

* * *

 

Sif and Fandral followed Angrboda down three backroads and up a paved trail.  That took them to the crest of a hill, where a fence ran as far as the eye could see to the left and to the right.  Angrboda opened the fence's gate, and left it ajar - the nearest thing to a sign that she knew she was being followed.

"A cemetery," Fandral said when he and Sif reached the gate.  _So many grave markers and cairns and mourning circles.  How many of these are from the War, and how many are from before or after?_

Seeing that Angrboda had stopped by a knee-high stone, "Wait here," Sif instructed Fandral, who nodded and complied.  Sif hurried over to her.

"Hello again," Angrboda said.

"Logi un a scescori," Sif read the grave marker, and translated it: "Loki the wounded."

Angrboda glanced at her.

"My family are ethnic Etin," Sif said.  "The language isn't as difficult for me as for my friends."

"I'd offer you a drink, but I'm that rarity - someone who doesn't imbibe in cemetaries, friend or not or the deceased."

"Were you?" Sif asks.  "Loki's friend, or...?" and her tongue stops before her lips do.

"I found him with blood everywhere, having dragged himself into a cat's den," Angrboda said.  "I stitched him back up, hauled him out of that place so he could recover.  He was quite annoying as he got better."

Sif chuckled.  "That's reassuring."

"He spoke praisingly of a Sif Ānstān, of whom he was not fit to lick her boots.  Nice to meet you," and she handed Sif a few envelopes.  "Logi asked me to give these to you."

"He did?"

"He knew you would find him," Angrboda said.  "Knew you'd find the house or his grave.  He wrote them in a language I don't know; knew they'd reach officials' eyes before the envelopes were returned to me."  When Sif started to reach for them, Angrboda cautioned her: "Some of the contents, Logi wrote when he was hysterical and beside himself in recovery."

Sif nodded, "Thank you," and accepted the letters.  Crouching down to rest one hand atop the grave marker, "Thank you, Loki."  _And I'll miss you.  Always._ Standing, "Thank you, Angrboda, for seeing to his..."

"I took care of him.  That made him my responsibility," she said, dipping her head in appreciation.  And, reading the fleeting looks on Sif's face, "And in answer to what you keep unmanaging to ask me, no."

"No?"

"He and I never did anything untowards.  For one, I am a widow.  For another, his mind was focused principally on yourself."

"And the remainder?" Sif asked.

"Is in the envelopes," Angrboda said.  "I confess a certain curiosity - is it an Asgardian cultural trait, to be flattered that another woman suspects her so deeply?"

"I'm sorry...much as Loki assured me otherwise, it wasn't always easy to believe I was the only person he cared for," Sif said, remembering how once Loki had said 'you all know what Thor is like'... _and had I pursued something with Thor, as Loki initially thought I would - he didn't think he was worth my time - it would in all likelihood be true, not a fear._

"Worry not.  I've witnessed such infidelities, and Loki was the cause of none of them.  Now, shall we return to my house for a meal before you leave, or would you prefer going directly to the border?"

 

Even in his wounded, maimed state, Loki had kept enough of his wits about himself, to write down about the Big Damn Threat that he felt was in need of warning people of.  A threat which moved in shadow, and had already brought down vulnerable points overseas, save for where a band calling themselves 'Guardians' had stopped the Threat, for a time.  And it was coming towards the kingdoms, with all signs suggesting it would strike next at the lands Thor was hanging out in.

Written in a fine, neat, careful penning to one side of Loki's observations of the Very Big Threat, was a message:  **Ask for our help, and we will give it.  -General Skadi.**  


End file.
